You can develop a healthy robust community that lives right with God only if you do the hard work of getting along with each other with honor and dignity. -James 3:18
I have heard missionaries say one of the hardest things they have dealt with and one of the biggest reasons why missionaries give up is other missionaries.
Jesus asks us to love and we think it sweet, untill...
-The dishes never gets done
-Your spend hours cooking and they have the nerve to give you cooking tips and comments on how loud you are in the kitchen
-they stand and look at you running to serve everybody coffee, even when the are appointed to help you
-After serving them coffee they pull up their noses for your coffee in front of you.
Love is Patient!
It is Kind
It does not envy
In every situation there is an opportunity to lay down your fake sense of 'I deserve' which has no ground. Think that is why we turn to anger. It is the easy way out of conviction. Easy way out of love...
Love is a force undiscovered by the world. We are all under the illusion that "I am the main character" and we are all screaming out ways we should be loved, angry that nobody hears us. How ironic. Nobody shuts up and loves. Nobody listens to the needs of their neighbors, not even to mention the needs of their dearest loved ones. And so the universe is groaning and pleading for love! More and more we are disappointed in our loved ones, because we were made to experience a much deeper love than this world could offer. And so we give up and settle for small bits of it, forcing those around us to live with the disappointment that they were just not enough.
When you look at it that way, wouldn't you say you are literally fighting against the very thing Jesus is doing with His people. He died to set them free from the lies you keep throwing at them. Kind of like satan, just saying...
Key one- people are never going to make you happy.
Matthew 10:8 Freely you have received, freely give.
He saw our whole lives and nothing we did pleased Him and yet He still loves us.
Sit down, be humble. Myself included.
So just for a second let your mind go: there is not one person out there with the same framework or foundation. You are the only one that looks at life through your lenses, shaped by your life up on till now. Do think it could be possible that your judgement of them could not have any solid ground to stand on?
Only He sees and knows all, and IS the only solid foundation, and He decided to rather have mercy anyway.
So when He challenges us to love one another, it means to want His will for them. So ask yourself: am I helping this bride become whole?
When one of us suffer, we all suffer.
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